Posts by soft electrons

Consumer segment fuels soaring PC sales

Bringing the notebook home

I am sure as more and more workplaces provides notebooks, people will bring the notebook home. Kids are getting laptops from schools too: http://www.edutopia.org/tips-protect-laptop-computers-theft

Intel touts NAND-killer breakthrough

heard this one before

Numonyx previously used BJTs to do PCM. They introduce OTS here for multilayer but actually only demonstrating single layer. Having studied OTS I can say they are going out on a limb. Just to convince industry to use PCM instead of flash is difficult . Now we also have to rely on OTS instead of transistor. Two immature technologies... bad move.

Idle wild: how Intel's mobile Core i7 speeds up to slow down

@BobTB

It would depend on power*time (or its integration) difference. Maybe you halve the time (double the clock), but the power is going to be more than that by the voltage increase squared, right?

mobile don't care

For mobile users, the speed gain with power hike is not noticeable, but the battery life will be more noticeable. I don't think this is the right target but then maybe there is no other opportunity. Servers and enterprise should be all multithread by now (so running every core).

SanDisk flashes its extra bits

practically analog

4 bits or 16 levels is practically like analog more than digital. Noise sensitivity, reduced signal margins, I don't think they can use it for so many applications.

Samsung overtakes Numonyx in PRAM race

another 512 Mb PRAM announcement

It doesn't make sense if they are out to kill off their own NOR flash and NAND flash products. It is just some marketing announcement. Maybe they did fab a 60 nm 512 Mb chip that behaves the way it is said, but they can't be running this through their flash fabs. I mean now that Spansion went bankrupt, there is so much more demand for Numonyx and Samsung's NOR flash, they'd be silly to throw it all away for phase change memory. Taiwan's memory companies would love Samsung and Numonyx to abandon their NOR for PRAM, now that Spansion is struggling.

Intel to deliver Postville in August

capacity not speed

The disk is used for capacity not speed; cache is used for speed not capacity. Many application files once they exceed MB they slow down the processor. But even the largest streamed video file will not require more than 1 GB, so I think the high-speed performance aspects of drives are overkill.

Intel in (halfhearted) SSD boost

HDD still cheaper

HDD still cheaper per bit.

Toshiba hopes for 3D flash chip within three years

Cost per transistor layer stays same

3D is definitely a sure way (and in the future maybe the only way) to increase bit capacity. But unlike standard shrinking of a single transistor layer, you are adding (stacking) many of such layers up, so the cost is being multiplied compared to the single layer.

Intel goes to ultraviolet extremes

secondary electrons

EUV like Ebeam and X-rays produces a variable number of secondary electrons. This was part of their explanation for accumulating contamination on their mirrors. I think these extra roaming particles will add some variation to the dose calculation.